Thursday, 22 December 2011

The second D&D character I ever had was a ranger. In those days the ranger was the only fighter that could wield two weapons at the same time and this was why in Advanced Dungeons & Dragons there were plenty of them.

My ranger was, and still is, a wood elf from the Cormanthor forest who even spent some time living in the elven fortress of Evereska. With him I played lots of adventures and also the second chapter of Baldur's Gate saga (Shadows of Amn) and both Icewind Dale games during my high school years and later. After a first cycle of adventuring (and some planar travels) he retired for a while, because i switched to a different kind of characters like spellcasters for some time. Then came 3rd edition rules (Dungeons & Dragons 3.0) and I chose this guy to approach the new game. Lots of tales again. Lots of enemies slain in the name of Rillifane Rallatil.

His name is Sol'Kanar, taken from a legendary creature of the game Magic The Gathering which has nothing else to do with my ranger. I just liked the name when i was a really young D&D and Magic player at the same time.

I chose a quite rare miniature (that came for free together with White Dwarf) to represent him: it is Aenur, the Sword of Twilight from Mordheim, the 1999 GW game. He was a high elf mercenary, kind of a swordsman. I like this miniature basically because of the cape and the sword, i found those things well representing the ranger fashion tipical of Sol'Kanar Fireblade.

Thursday, 15 December 2011

This miniature represents my very first D&D character which I created in 1992-93 circa when I was just a kid. At that time I used to play with an italian edition of the classic D&D boxed set and its expansions:

In the beginning he was a simple cleric, without any focus: the cleric was just a healer with some fighting skills even if he couldn't use any edged weapon; its "forgiving" nature of priest forbid him to make the blood run. His name is now Alexei Draconis but in the first years was Alex of Dragons (which is kind of a silly name for a fantasy character but i guess that's how it goes when you are 7). With the shift to the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons rules set, this guy became a cleric of Tempus but still he bore a morning star or some other bludgeoning weapon. The axe came with the 3rd edition of the rules. Needless to say that all this memories make me really nostalgic!

Right now Alexei Draconis lives in Cimbar, a city of Chessenta (in Faerun, Forgotten Realms), and runs a big temple of good gods. He's involved as a NPC in my last D&D campaign. I wonder if I will ever make him go to adventure another time with a party of adventurers...
By the way, this miniature is a converted Guard of the Citadel (from Lord of the Rings range by Harlequin miniatures). Quite rare stuff, I guess.

Friday, 9 December 2011

When i bought my Battle Masters box it was 1992 circa and i was just a little kid so i had no skill at all in painting miniatures. After almost 20 years i'm ready to paint all of that miniatures in an old school fashion, like the way they were painted at that time.This is an orc which i'm going to use for my Dungeons & Dragons campaign. I painted it to make it look pretty much like the leader of the mob so i gave him some bright clothes and a magical weapon. I'm really happy with the highlights of the skin (50% goblin green + 50% sunburst yellow) and also with the GW's Burnt Grass that is invaluable on a rock base like this one.